My Thule wing bars are off the car as i’ve got some long road trips planned over the next few weeks, and want to bag an extra few % of fuel economy and not have any wind noise accompanying me on the many hours of driving to come.

Over the past couple of years they’ve been on the roof they’re pretty filthy along the Leading Edge and it wont shift with normal soap and water. Obviously I don’t want to use anything abrasive, so what else can I try to clean off the black grime that has accumilated? Would alloy wheel cleaner work or is there something better anyone can suggest?

Thanks.

Flash…………….AaaaaaaaaAAAAAaaaaaaaghhh! Saviour of the Universe.

I use it for cleaning the outside of my Static caravan every spring to shift all the accumulated green stuff. If it works on Aluminium cladding it might work on aluminium roof bars?
Also , use a nail brush.

Whenever I put the bars on my car, I remark how dirty they are. And how much worse they look once the annual multi-thousand mile road trip is complete.

Then I take them off and forget all about it..!

WD40 / Gt85 should do the trick

Did my wing bars last week with muck-off and an old towel, came up a treat and got rid of the grime and squashed bugs!

mine have been on for over 2 yrs and are similarly manky, so will get into them with the muc off I guess !

I do give them an annual once over, lube, grease re tighten etc but never cleaned this set (wing bars) since buying early 13.

While cleaning them occasionally is probably a good idea, I’m not sure it’ll really make any noticeable difference to fuel efficiency unless they’re literally covered in a cm of crap.

Going slightly OT, but I fancy having black wing bars instead of silver. What would be suitable to paint them with that’ll last?

Plastikote, etc. would be fairly cheap unless you’re going to anodise them but no paint is really going to be robust enough to take metal to metal contact (eg attaching bike racks) regularly.

Powder coat is another option (not technically paint of course)

Or anodising but you may end up spending a lot to find an anodiser with big enough tanks.

Or could you use insulation tape (neatly) 🙂